On June 26, Sheffield Buddhist Centre will join the international Triratna Buddhist Community to demonstrate our desire for peace, and our opposition to nuclear power. Santasiddhi and Christine will lead the event, which may be akin to a "love-in" as prescribed by Sangharakshita in his 1984 talk on "Buddhism, World Peace, and Nuclear War" (*).
The meditation will take place in the Great Hall during Summer Fair at 13:15.
In 2016, parliament will vote whether to replace and modernise the UK's nuclear weapons system called Trident. It's made up of four submarines – one of which is on patrol at all times - carrying up to 40 nuclear warheads on board. Each of these warheads is eight times more powerful than the atomic bomb which was dropped on Hiroshima.
The government is in favour of replacing Trident at a cost of around £100 billion. This money would be enough to fully fund A&E services for 40 years, employ 150,000 new nurses, build 1.5 million affordable homes, build 30,000 new primary schools, or cover tuition fees for 4 million students. For more information, see the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
(*) In his talk on Buddhism, World Peace, and Nuclear War (1984) Sangharakshita said: “Full-scale nuclear war means fire-storms and `black rain’. It means the destruction of the ecosphere. It means the death of the earth. It means the suicide of humanity.” Because the issue is so serious, he calls on us to act:
“Pressure can also be brought to bear by the persistent lobbying of members of parliament, by the presentation of petitions, by public meetings, marches, and demonstrations, by fasts and solemn vigils - even by `love-ins’ and `be-ins’. By these and similar means the government should be left in no doubt as to what the wishes of the electorate really are. If it remains unresponsive to those wishes, or not sufficiently responsive - and the situation is one of extreme urgency, where every day is precious - then more serious measures should be taken and pressure brought to bear on the government by means of mass civil disobedience along Gandhian lines.”
